Tell me a deer hunting story please!

[KyFlintlock]

ok guys, I need a deer hunting FIX! Tell me a story of a deerhunt that still comes to mind.

You didn't have to kill the monster buck, any deer will do!

 

[roundball]

At first gray light during the November rut, an 8 pointer, and 30 minutes later a 7 pointer...50cal Flintlock, patched round ball, 40-50yds...perfect weather, perfect morning in the fall woods, North Carolina
:front:

 

[Runner]

Middle of the day on opening day. Deer all morning but not the right one and a cup of coffee was needed since I am a union hunter. Coffee breaks are written into the contract! Maybe I am not as serious about it as I once was too. I have hunted alone with the flinter the last two years mostly and it isn't about the score. The new regs requiring at least 4 points on a side had made the morning exciting but no shooters had come by. A shot rattled the windows coming from the property edge about 150 yards from the house. I slipped off that way to see what was happening and who was shooting where they were not supposed to be. I saw no one, and was slipping back towards the house along the lake following a deer trail, when suddenly there were deer everywhere. A bunch of bucks was chasing a doe. They ran past me and the doe stopped to look at the strange thing standing in the trail for a second or so. All of the bucks locked up too. I counted 7, but there may have been more. When the doe decided to take off, one of the little bucks took the distraction as an excuse to hit another in the butt with his horns and they turned right down the trail at me, one running for his life, and the other trying to hit him again. I stepped sideways off the trail and actually fended deer off with the rifle as they ran by. Just as quick as they arrived, they were gone. The second day, I got up, took the boat across the lake in the dark, and slipped to a stand I had set up the day before. I was there at least 45 minutes before light. After it got light, I caught movement along a drain that runs into the lake thru thick cover. I thought something was wrong with my eyes as the animal dropped into the ditch out of sight at about 50 to 60 yards. It popped up out of the ditch a few yards farther down for a few more yards in plain sight. A full grown mountain lion was hunting the same patch I was! I did not see any deer that morning for some reason! I hunted the rest of the week. I never did kill, but my hunt was made opening weekend with several treasured memories, and I saw deer all season. A month later on a doe hunt at the same farm, I found a small 7 point carcass about 6 foot inside the fence where that shot had come from. It was borderline whether or not the 4 on the one side would have qualified under the new rules, so they left him lay. The full deer hunting experience. Fast heart pounding action. Sights not seen or even believed by those who don't spend the time out there. Shots turned down because the deer wasn't legal or the shot wasn't right. The flintlock shot right where the front sight was when it went off, right over the does back later in the week! Trespassers and ingnorant behavior from them. A dose of controvery and a full dose of that thing so hard to explain the keeps us going back. It is way to early in the year to be starting these thoughts stirring guys!

 

[jackc]

Okay, I will tell you a deer hunting story that will make you feel better about your past hunts.

A friend and I were drawn for a special hunt at the Pushmataha Wildlife Management Unit near Clayton, Oklahoma. Our work schedules did not allow any pre-hunt scouting opportunities and we arrived at the site very late on Friday night. The hunt was for Saturday and Sunday.

We set up camp in the dark and tried to get a few hours sleep before hunting the next morning. It was an either-sex hunt and we figured on taking the first deer we saw. This was a meat hunt and neither of us were picky.

Hours before daylight we were at a pretty good looking draw in the hilly terrain. Oak and pines were aplenty and it looked like a pretty good spot. Several live creeks snaked through the bottoms and, it being a particularly dry fall, this boded well for our efforts.

Even in the dark I could tell stalking was going to be a bust. The earth was like walking on Kellogs Corn Flakes. The crunching sound seemed to carry on forever. I found a small tree several yards off a trail and settled in to wait for daybreak.

The sun had not been up all that long when I spied a dark shape coming up the hill toward me. It seemed it was on the same trail I was sitting near. All I knew was that it was a large critter, and I got ready.

I don't know how long it took for the animal to come in to sight, but it seemed like a long time. It was a very large feral boar...I figure it weighed at least 450 lbs. Since this was Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation property, I didn't know if I was allowed to shoot it or not. So, I let it pass by less than 20 yards away. As it turns out, I could have killed it legally.

Less than 30 minutes after it was gone, I heard a shot above me from the road. A mid-morning investigation indicated a road hunter had gut shot the boar. I trailed him until after noon but lost the sign. Heat and hunger eventually forced me back to the truck where I knew water and food awaited.

My buddy was already there when I arrived and I told him about my morning. An ODWC official stopped by to check on us and I told him about the boar. He promised to check it out. We lunched and rested for a little while and decided to check out the next draw. Both sides of the rode looked about the same and I had no objection when my partner took his choice.

I took a quick compass read and headed down the side of the piney ridge. After a moderate hike I found myself at the convergence of several well worn trails in an area rich with browse and mast producing trees. I settled in at the base of a giant tree and day-dreamed/napped for some time.

It was only about 30 to 45 minute before dark that I was aware of movement above me. I peaked around the tree I was recling against to see a large group of whitetails coming down one of the trails I had scouted. As quietly as possible, I scooted around on my knees to come to position to take a shot.

The largest deer in the group that I could see was about halfway in the middle of the lot. Taking a rest against the side of the tree I had been recling against, I sighted and tripped the trigger of my Lyman Great Plains Rifle. What resulted was one of the worst hang-fires I have ever experienced.

I guess i must have flinched downward because when the smoke cleared, the deer I had fired on was down but then got back up. Its front right leg was clearly ruined but it could still run. Reloading as quickly as I could, I pursued it.

After several more atttempts I finally put paid to the whitetail. It was a young buck of almost 100 lbs. By this time, it was almost completely dark. I started dragging the carcass toward the road which I estimated was about 1/2 to 3/4 miles away.

Some time later, after not reaching the road, I knew i was lost. I was dragging the deer in the wrong direction. I had resigned myself to building a fire and spending the night in the woods....then I remembered the compass reading I had taken earler. I was moving in almost the exact opposite direction I thought I was.


I reached the road where the pickup was parked fairly quickly after that. My buddy gave me heck for getting lost...but I had a deer and he didn't.

That's one of my deer stories.
jack

 

[Slamfire]

It were near half a century ago, on a cold December day. A boy shivered in the fork of a tree, next to a thicket his family called the upper meadow. It was the first doe season in his memory, and his Dad had handed him up the Remington pump in .30 Remington that his Granddad had loaned him, then circled around the thicket. About 20 minutes after getting settled he spotted an 8 point buck bounding along in the brush by the creek that ran through the lower meadow, safely out of sight most of the time. Then right at the corner of the thicket within spittin' distance of his tree, a doe and her yearlin' came bustin' out of the trees and took off diagonally up a hilly field. The doe lead off, with the yearling half a length behind and on the same side as the boy. He swung along on the doe's nose, like he'd learned shotgunnin' pheasants earlier that fall. But, when the lead looked right he stopped swingin' and pulled the trigger. The yearling skidded along on her nose, shot through the spine at the base of the neck. It was his first, and though more than 50 others have followed its the one I never forget. ::

 

[GobblerKnob]

Ky ~ here's a link to an article I wrote a few years ago for the Pennsylvania Game News. It's not a deer hunting story, per se, but my perspective on hunting itself. Enjoy...
Rick

http://www.gobblerknoblongrifles.com/pondering/why.pdf

 

[hobbles]

How bout a yote story,
I was sittin and waitin for deer to wander by when I seen a yote commin up the path, So I watched and thought bout takin the shot, I was after deer but winter was commin on and I needed a new hat for riddin my horse, So I decided to take it, I watched to make sure where it was goin, and then cocked the hammer and it stopped and startin lookin round,, It was behind a tree and I couldn't get the shot I wanted, so I waited to sea what it was goin to do,, It started to move forward again and I hit the set trigger,, It heard that too,, Then it stopped again and we made eye contact, was a strange feelin, it was behind nother tree, just the front part of it was behind the tree with it's head stickin out both times, so I had to wait, It decided to take off,, it ran back the way it came, bout 15 foot then stopped, turned round and started to run the other way, the way it was goin in the first place, I had 3 different places I could take a good shot, One was bout 5" then 10' then bout 15'. so I went with the 15 " thinkin I would have time to get setup, didn't work out that way,, I raised my weapon up to get ready and it was THERE and it was movin, So I took the shot, got it behind the front leg and went thru both lungs, High on my side and low on the other, It went down, never made it one" forward, So I got my hat,
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v323/hobbles/otie-hat.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v323/hobbles/yotehat.jpg

 

[Stumpkiller]

here's one I wrote a couple years back:

The Old Archer

The old archer wasn't keeping up well. We were walking the mostly abandoned "Upper Course" on the hill behind his archery club and roving the decaying straw butts that were returning to nature. I noticed a grayness about his complexion and it scared the hell out of me, so we sat down and rested a bit. He was working his way back from a bad time with angina, balloon angioplasty and shunts and insisted he was ready to "get back to shootin".

"I remember when we set this course" he said after catching his breath. "We had shots over the gully and down into it. Good field shots. Now it's just like the flat course around the club. A damn golf course. The last time they let me help set the 3-D I had deer half behind trees and at angles, shots through brush and off the lanes. Didn't set out any pegs for yardages, just the target number stakes. You never heard such wailing. Bunch of babies".

I met the old archer some fifteen years before that; when he was about my age as I write this. He would have nailed my ears to the floor if he ever heard me call him an "old" anything. In addition to NFAA and state-level archery medals and trophies he had dozens of wrestling and Karate awards. My first introduction was at a boat ramp on one of New York's Finger Lakes. We each had trailerable sailboats, mine a fiberglass model that looked old fashioned and his a wooden boat he had built himself. In talking he mentioned he sold plans for a small bateau that could be sailed or rowed, and that he used it when bowhunting.

"Bowhunting?" says I. "I bowhunt."

Well I got myself an invite to his house to check out this boat, and of course I brought along my longbow. No gnomes in this guy's yard. After climbing a driveway that could be featured in Jeep commercial I found the house nestled in amongst the trees. He had a mini 3-D course set so you could circle the yard and have 20 to 40 yard shots at foam deer, boar, turkey, and the infamous rabbit on top of a stack of haybales with a half acre of raspberry bushes behind. "Added reason not to miss." The house was patrolled by an Airedale named "Dudley" who turned out to be the happiest 80lb lap dog I ever met. "A disgrace to his breed" according to his master, but the two were inseparable.

I came to think of him as the old archer after that first visit, not because of his age, but because he was a holdout from the age before compounds. He owned one, but it never took hold with him. The walls of his den were covered with old selfbows, early Martins (he had been a dealer for them at one time), Brownings, Wings, Ben Pearsons. More traditional bows in one room that I had seen in my life up until then. He also had some laminated recurves of his own manufacture, several showing damage from destructive testing as he worked on design improvements.

By the time I left that day he had given me plans for one of his "Balsam Swamp Bateaus" and an invite to join him at an archery club he belonged to for a trip around the outdoor course. I ended up joining and shooting in an indoor winter league, which improved my shooting immensely. I could never hold a candle to him. If the feathers of his fletching weren't touching it wasn't good shooting. My family had always enjoyed archery at my grandpa's "farm" of five acres in the country, but no one was a hunter. My grandpa had been before WWI, but after he got back he never hunted for sport. No doubt about it, I was a target archer. The old archer set about to change that. Roving with him went out to 45 or 50 yards, sometimes farther. Always in cover, usually between close trees or over odd terrain, and he seldom missed. On the 3-D course we always shot from the farthest stake, him making effortless super kills and me trying my darnedest to keep them in the vitals so as not to disgrace us in front of the compound shooters.

By the next spring I had completed my bateau and we took it to the lake it was named for that fall: Balsam Swamp. The lake is remote enough in the foothills of the Adirondacks, and the back side is further isolated by a swamp on either end of the lake, cutting access from the single dirt road that approaches the lake. We filled the boat with gear and I rowed us across the lake and into the past. Pleasure boating happens at 80

 

[KyFlintlock]

Guys,

Great stories of past hunts! :thumbsup:

StumpKiller - THAT is what it is all about! Great tribute!! :front:

1st Flintlock buck:
I had received the flintlock as a gift that summer, a complete surprise! I floundered around a bit that summer with it, trying to figure it out. Took a squirrel, coyote and a groundhog in the months to follow.

The opening morning of the early muzzleloader season found me setup on a gas pipeline cut-through where the deer crossed. A HEAVY dew set that morning and as the sky started to turn pink and the birds started to awake, my heart began to pound. Pretty soon, I figured a deer would show and I was going to shoot the first one I had a good shot at.

"SNAP", I heard a twig crack just into the thicket. I swung the rifle around and pulled the set trigger. A few minutes passed and I saw the gray form moving through the brush...Then it stopped and I saw ears swiveling around, then a tail flick. My heard really stated to POUND. A few more steps and the small buck would be in my shooting lane. I laid the hammer back and he moved forward into the opening at 35 yards. I took aim and ..'ker-flatch'. :: No puff or shot!! I laid the hammer back again and 'ker-flatch'..nothing. Then, I noticed the flint was SOPPING wet from the dew and weeds I had gone through. I reached down quickly and wiped it dry with my sleeve. By this time the small buck was stomping and I knew this was it! I took aim again and was thankful the buck was young as he started to turn to run and I fired. In disbelief the rifle fired and the buck bounded away. I watched him run 75 yards, bounding like the dickens, then disappearing into the brush...

I couldn't breathe, my heart was in my ears! I wiped the rifle down again and reloaded, then went to check for blood. Nothing, I had missed! I continued to follow his trail where I saw him run...and saw a drop of blood. YES! Another 30 yards into the brush and I saw him with his head stretched forward and his legs back, he had died in mid run. I thanked the good Lord for the deer and took a DEEP BREATH and celebrated the .50cal flinter and the PRB...

Wess

 

[wilded]

Took my angel on her first hunt. She shot two cull exotic does and this management buck. On the way back to the house she looks up at me and says " not much to this hunting thing is there dad?" Ain't it great. ET :thumbsup:

 

[flintlockmdj]

In the second picture the yote looks the best. :kid: :crackup: :crackup: :crackup:

 

[hobbles]

whitebear
Thanks,, I needed that,, :cry:

 

[hobbles]

wilded
" not much to this hunting thing is there dad?"

That's funny,, but it looks like you taught her well...
good job dad,,,

 

[jaybeach]

Since someone else has already broken the ice on a non-BP hunt, I'll tell of my first deer hunting experience (at the time, I thought all Muzzleloaders were antiques that probably weren't safe to shoot)!
Anyway, there I was in the woods on opening day with a borrowed .32 Special and an "either sex" permit (unheard of to get one your first try back then - we're talkin' mid-1960's). I was determined to let "all the does" I would see pass because I wanted a buck. After the first day of seeing nothing, I said, "I might take a doe on the 3rd day (our last) if I don't get a buck before that." By the end of the second day, I said, "If I see a deer, I'm going to shoot it" (hadn't even seen one yet).
So most of the 3rd morning had passed uneventfully when I heard the loud "crunch, crunch, crunch" of what I thought must be some noisy hunter making his way through my area (my dad had told me how quiet deer can be). Glancing over to my right, I was amazed to see a mature doe bounding through the dry leaves on a course that would bring her past my tree no more than 20 yards away! I raised the lever action to my shoulder, put the front sight on hers and pulled the trigger as she passed in front of me. Seeing no immediate reaction, I quickly levered another cartridge in and fired again just before she topped out over a ridge about 50 yards away.
A careful investigation showed no blood, no hair - no sign of a hit.
Meeting my dad at the car at our pre-arranged time, I related the story to him.
"Where did you put the front sight?", he asked. "Right on her front shoulder", I replied. "She was so close I figured I didn't need much lead."
"I see - and where was the rear sight?", he said.
After thinking back to the event I said, "What rear sight?"

 

One that got away: When I got out of the Army at the end of 1971 I did not own a deer rifle. I went back to Penn State for grad school and traded a Marlin .22 mag and a .36 H&A underhammer for one (I had no cash). A buddy showed me a place on the flanks of Mt Nittany, an abandoned farm with apple trees and a spring that lay above a big cornfield. We scouted it and located a couple good spots to sit and waited for opening day. It snowed 6 inches by am opening day. We trudged into the farm along an old dirt road (now white) and I took a place near a truly huge old hardwood tree, where an old rock wall ran by it. The spot overlooked a trail from the cornfield up to an apple tree and a spring. My buddy went on across the farm to another rock wall. It was still dark. I musta dozed a minute, and looked up to see a doe eyeball to eyeball--she dashed off. That woke me up and I became more alert. The sun was just up when I saw a huge buck with an impressive rack walking slowly up the trail towards me. I eased the rifle into position and waited for a clean shot--then I heard two fellows on the trail below, talking loudly and evidently coming up the trail too. The buck spooked and ran past me at about 75 yards. Now, I have to digress: the iron sights on the rifle shot 6 inches high at 100 yards with a 6 o'clock hold (!) and I could not lower them more. I kept telling myself to aim low, but when that buck spooked I forgot! My shot went right over him I am sure. The two fellows came into view, rifles slung, coffee cups in hand, cigs dangling from their mouths, "Didya get him?" No. I tracked the deer in the new snow up onto the ridgeline and saw places where he stopped and looked back at me. It was obvious after several miles that I wasn't going to catch him and I went back. When I came within sight of the farm I heard my buddy shoot and went to find him with a nice 6 point buck--nothing like the one I missed, but good eating, and, after all, we were just poor students.[my buddy by the way, who died a couple years ago, was a Marine VNam vet who is the only guy I have ever known that killed someone in hand-to-hand with a Bowie knife, but that is another story].

 

[Bob J]

My First Blackpowder Buck (or The Renegade Saves the Day)-
It was opening day of muzzleloading season and I was on a ladderstand in the river swamp. A crisp 37 degree morning and here come two bucks! They passed about 15 yards behind me. As I turned to aim, the lead buck bolted but the second one froze. Firing the .50 CVA inline at the shoulder I was amazed to see it sprint away with no sign of a hit :shocking: :shake: Climbing down and searching the ground there was no blood or hair to be found. Walking the direction it ran, I saw a doe feeding about 75 - 100 yards away totally unconcerned (although canopied over, the woods open up down in the river swamp floodplain).

Got back up on the ladderstand and wasn't long till I hear my brother's .54 Renegade bellow off thru the woods. :hmm: Maybe he's fared better. About 45 more minutes pass and here comes another buck! But as he gets closer, he turns and starts heading up towards thickly-wooded ridge behind me. Seeing one opening at about 75 yards I took a shot even though there was a little guinea grass in-between. He went down! Practically jumping off the stand and reloading I went up to him but he sprang up and ran. I fired but he kept going. Not having anymore loads I called my brother JJ on the walkie-talkie to come help me find the deer, "and bring your .54". Having missed a big buck and figuring the shot had ruined his hunting, JJ had gone back to camp so he made it to my spot in about 5 minutes.

We started looking and almost immediately the buck got up and start ambling away. Grabbing my brother's Renegade, I ran down into the swamp after it, JJ following me at a distance. He said the following scene was out of a movie; The buck turned broadside looking at his pursuers. I braced the rifle against a tree and, allowing for the distance, held near the top of the back. KaWhoom! 90 grains of 2f sent the 425 grain Maxi-Ball to the shoulder area dropping the deer in its tracks.

We started dragging the buck, about a 140 lb 5-point, towards the trail that leads up to camp. And we drag and drag and drag. Darn, how far is it? JJ stays with the deer and I head on towards the trail but can't find it. :: We've gotten turned around :curse: JJ went on ahead and found it (Thank you Lord! :master

As I showed him where the first two deer were behind my ladderstand, JJ said "thats strange, trees don't break off like that". There was a 1" sapling broken in two about 6 ft up, a perfect half inch (read .50 caliber) semi-circle through the middle. Obviously it had altered the course of the Powerbelt bullet I had fired at the first deer.

 

[CrackStock]

I had never hunted deer with a ML previously and really wanted to get one with a gun that I had assembled. I had put together 3 ML guns from kits and given 2 to family members so that we could all hunt together. We sought out opportunities and through professional and family contacts, we found a great opportunity to hunt a virgin hard wood bottom that belonged to a timber company. The land had been kept as a special hunt club. For scouting, doing some road and ground prep, getting the club into DMAP compliance (they were not good hunters) and some cleanup, we got both early and late primitive seasons to hunt deer. As the only person with much ML knowledge,(I had been shooting monthly for over a year) my job was to keep the guns up and firing.

Well, I had scouted and found that getting to where I wanted to hunt required hip boots. So on the morning of the hunt, I was loaded with a mix of modern and primitive gear. I sloshed through cold high water in the dark and made my way to the stand. I had climbed up and my hands were very cold. I leaned my gun inside the stand and just began slipping down the hip boots to put on my warmer boots when the thought struck me how comical it would be for a deer to walk out on me at this ridiculous moment. Through the gray mist, I saw a darker gray silhouette of a buck crossing the open ground. I noted the location, picked up the rifle, pulled the hammer back to full and set the trigger. My breath slightly obscured my view for a moment, but I was soon on target and touched off an awful click. I had left the cap cover on. The sound of the first hammer fall stopped the buck in his tracks. I pulled back to full again, removed the cover and sighted again. The deer was still looking in my general direction, but not seeing me when the shot broke. All I saw was white smoke and gray fog while I reloaded. There was no wind so I was leaning out trying to see around the smoke. My boots were down to my knees and I was trying to get out of the stand. (I have since learned to wait for some time to let them settle down rather than risk spooking them into a run.) I lowered the gun and managed to not break my neck. I capped and walked with these boots and straps flapping about over to the spot that I had marked and found blood and KNEE tracks. I saw that the tracks had turned back which I have always taken as a very good sign of a hit in addition to the above noted. He made it less than 25 yards into a thicket and was down.

This was a shot that I would not attempt today as it was too far. Now, I make notes on visible distance references so I know my range, but I was lucky in several ways on this day. It all worked.

YMHS,
CrackStock

 

[Ron LaClair]

This is what I call my snowstorm buck. One afternoon near my camp in Michigans U.P. I was sitting near a scrape on a typical late fall day. I had been watching this scape for several days hoping to catch the buck that made it when he came in to check it.

About an hour before dark it started to snow, light at first but soon it was coming down so hard you couldn't see 30yd's. At this point the ground was bare but the snow was coming so heavy it soon covered the ground. I was about to head in because I thought the deer wouldn't be moving in this storm when I saw him coming through the white screen like a ghost out of the fog or in this case snow.

I barely had time to get ready and put an arrow on the string of my 72# osage selfbow. As he circled the scrape to get downwind I sent a cedar shaft tipped with one of Glenn Parkers big two blade broadheads. The shot took him in the neck and he went down thrashing. I was elated for just a few seconds and then much to my surprise he was up and running. He headed down hill towards the "ArmStrong Creek" and I heard him splash as he crossed into the heavy cedar swamp.

I took up the trail right away because I thought I'd lose it in the heavy snow if I waited. He was leaving a pretty good trail in the snow but after I got across the ArmStrong into the dark swamp there was no snow on the ground yet and the trail was hard to follow. With my flashlight and on my hands and knees I picked up his trai and slowly followed deeper into the swamp.

After losing the trail several times then finding it again I finely came onto him well after dark. Having no rope and too far from camp to drag him out that night, I dressed him and hung him off the ground the best that I could with my bowstring. As it turned out if I hadn't hung him off the ground that night he would have been buried in the snow and I may not have found him.

I got back to camp at 11:00pm that night as it continued to snow very hard. There was no one to greet me as I was camping alone. I crawled into my sleeping bag not realizing what was in store for me the next day.

When I stepped outside the next morning I couldn't believe the amount of snow that had accumulated during the night. A foot and a half of the fluffy white stuff lay on the ground. I thought, how in the world am I going to get my deer out of that swamp, and am I even going to be able to find him.

I knew there was a fellow bowhunter camped a mile or so from me and he had a canoe. I thought if he would let me borrow his canoe I could float down the "ArmStrong Creek" and get close to my buck. I pushed snow with the bumper of my 4x4 to the fellows camp and found him snuggled by the fire enjoying a cup of coffee.

It ended up the fellow offered to go with me and help. I gladly accepted his offer and luckly we remembered to bring a camera. Here is the results.

 

This one is about a doe who committed suicide...I was sitting in a low tree on a big limb when I heard a rustling behind me. I turned a little then heard a deer snort and run off. I figured that was it for the day but the sun was almost down so I decided to sit a while longer. Within five minutes, I heard the rustle again and turned back to see a doe looking straight at me. I moved a little and she ran off snorting again. This time, I stood up on the limb next to the trunk and hung my 45 caplock out in the general direction she had taken. Within a few minutes, she came back, picking her way thru the brush as she looked up at me again. This time, she caught a ball thru the head at about 15 yds.

Here's one my great-uncle did - I was with him and saw it...We were walking thru heavy cedar clumps back to the camp. We were not conversing but walking along with heads down. My uncle suddenly stopped, swung his rifle up and shot (he always used a 38-55 single shot Stevens with peep sights). The deer humped up and we lost sight of it. When we walked over, we found that a nice 6 point had reared back and wedged his antlers into a cedar crotch. The two of us could not lift the deer out of the limb so he gutted it hanging and we walked back to camp. We brought the other guys out to see it but no one could budge the rack so we got a little tree saw and cut one side of the limb to free the head. We figured the rack had wedged into some little irregularity in the limb and sprung back so it was locked.

 

[shmrck1]

KyFlintlock,
There is no way i can tell a story the way you
draw or the way the Kansan tells a story but i will try to
relate a story as it happened to me:
I was hunting in S.E. Ohio,Logan area maybe
10 or 12 years ago. In an area i try to get to and hunt
every year.
Normally i sit on top of a ridge overlooking
a ravine where three gullies come together...an outstanding site that i have harvested maybe 6 or 8 small but nice Bucks
from. This particular year i chose to move down off the ridge maybe 8 or 10 feet and was sitting on a piece of slate jutting from the side of the hill.
With feet dangling from the slate i had an outstanding view of the area maybe 35/40 feet below me, and had been sitting there for maybe 2 1/2 hours when i hear
a noise above and behind me. Knowing the wind is in my face and with all the scent cover i could put on i just knew
it was just my son coming to make sure i was O.K.
I waited maybe another 10/15minutes and did'nt hear another sound and i thought my son had found a stand he was going to work. I am overlooking my favorite ravine when i
hear a very short but loud snort again above and behind me. Again thinking it is my son fooling around i turn around, and to me see the biggest buck in the world....It could have been a fawn as i remember now because when i turned
to look at my son i fell of the jutting piece of slate into the ravine below with my .50cal Hawken following. Somewhere in the fall i got a 12 stich cut on the right side of my
head just above the ear.
Two days later i harvested a 6pt buck with my son standing real close over the same ravine. He is a very good son BTW.
I hope i did this story justice
snake-eyes :hatsoff: